The invention relates generally to network data processing.
Networking products such as routers require high speed components for packet data movement, i.e., collecting packet data from incoming network device ports and queuing the packet data for transfer to appropriate forwarding device ports. They also require high-speed special controllers for processing the packet data, that is, parsing the data and making forwarding decisions. Because the implementation of these high-speed functions usually involves the development of ASIC or custom devices, such networking products are of limited flexibility and thus tend to be quite rigid in their assignment of ports to the high-speed controllers. Typically, each controller is assigned to service network packets from for one or more given ports on a permanent basis.
In one aspect of the invention, forwarding data includes associating control information with data received from a first port and using the associated control information to enqueue the data for transmission to a second port in the same order in which the data was received from the first port.